Following national and provincial elections on April 22, 2009, African National Congress (ANC) president Jacob Zuma was elected president of South Africa. In the elections the ANC won 65.9% of the national vote; the Democratic Alliance (DA), 16.66%; and the newly formed Congress of the People (COPE), 7.42%. The DA won the Western Cape with 48.78% of the vote, but the ANC took the remaining eight provinces, reducing the Inkatha Freedom Party in its former stronghold of KwaZulu-Natal to 20.52% of the vote. COPE became the major opposition party in five provinces.

Construction workers strike outside the Soccer City stadium in Johannesburg after rejecting a wage …

Karel Prinsloo/AP

In the election campaign the ANC promised to retain its targets of halving poverty and unemployment by 2014 and maintained that creating employment would be the core mandate for economic policy. The DA promised a basic income grant of 110 rand (about $12) per month to all citizens earning less than 46,000 rand (about $5,000) per year and that it would cut the tax on companies, support privatization, and review labour legislation. COPE concentrated mainly on what it claimed were undemocratic practices in the ANC.

In February a framework agreement responding to the global economic crisis was reached between the government, labour, and business sectors, which reaffirmed a commitment to infrastructural spending as the core of a stimulus to growth and job creation. In his state of the nation address in June, Zuma committed the government to creating 500,000 job opportunities before the end of the year. Among changes in the postelection cabinet were the appointment of Pravin Gordhan, previously head of the South African Revenue Service, as finance minister to replace Trevor Manuel, who became head of the new National Planning Commission. By September the Congress of South African Trade Unions had become critical of Manuel’s planning program, accusing him of wanting to become a “prime minister” and arguing that former trade unionist Ebrahim Patel, appointed minister of economic development, should have responsibility for macroeconomic policy. In November Gill Marcus, former chairperson of Absa bank and financial group, replaced Tito Mboweni as governor of the Reserve Bank.

The judgment that the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) was politically motivated in its prosecution of Zuma (which catalyzed the recall of Pres. Thabo Mbeki in 2008) was overturned by the Supreme Court of Appeal in January, and charges of corruption, fraud, racketeering, and money laundering against Zuma were thus reinstated. On April 6, however, in a controversial decision, the NPA announced it was dropping the charges. It released transcripts of tape recordings between an NPA member and other parties that it said showed political interference in the decision to charge Zuma and errors of process. Zuma’s supporters claimed that this vindicated their standpoint that Zuma was innocent of the charges, though the NPA made clear that the decision did not amount to an acquittal. Opposition parties protested the decision.

The Judicial Service Commission decided not to proceed with the charges raised by judges of the Constitutional Court against Western Cape Judge President John Hlophe of having improperly attempted to influence the Court. President Zuma appointed Sandile Ngcobo as chief justice to succeed Pius Langa, whose term had expired.

The contract of suspended commissioner of police Jackie Selebi was not renewed when it expired in July, and he was replaced by Bheki Cele, former minister for community safety in KwaZulu-Natal. Selebi’s trial on charges of corruption began in October. In December 2008, Vusi Pikoli, suspended national director of public prosecutions, had been sacked for allegedly not paying enough attention to public security, though he claimed that his dismissal was related to his having charged Selebi with corruption. In August 2009, however, the North Gauteng High Court ruled that his dismissal was invalid. In November he was paid 7.5 million rand (about $1 million) by the government to withdraw his court challenge contesting his dismissal.

Helen Suzman, the only Progressive Party MP from 1961 to 1974 and a veteran antiapartheid campaigner, died on New Year’s Day. Schabir Shaik, sentenced to 15 years in jail in 2005 after his conviction for fraud and corruption and accused by the judge of having a “generally corrupt” relationship with Zuma, was released from jail early in the year on the grounds that he was terminally ill, though the severity of his illness was widely doubted.

From midyear there were many strikes. These included a protracted strike by doctors over wages and conditions in hospitals, a weeklong strike over wages and benefits by construction workers involved in, among other things, building stadiums for the association football (soccer) World Cup games in 2010, and a weeklong strike by municipal workers over wages.

Economy

The economy was severely affected by the world recession. Having grown 0.2% in the third quarter of 2008, it shrank by 1.8% in the fourth quarter, 7.4% in the first quarter of 2009, and 2.8% in the second quarter, recovering to 0.9% growth in the third quarter. Growth was 3.1% for 2008 as a whole. During 2009 nearly one million jobs were lost, and from July 2008 to July 2009, manufacturing production slumped by 13.7%.

Inflation, which had peaked at 13.6% in August 2008, fell during 2009 to 6.4% in August and was expected to average 5.9% through the year, inside the official target range. This permitted the Reserve Bank to make cuts of 5% in interest rates between December 2008 and August 2009. In 2008 the deficit on the current account of the balance of payments was 7.4% of GDP, a 36-year peak, but it eased during 2009.

Owing to the need for continued state spending in conditions of recession and lessened revenue, the 2009–10 budget deficit was projected in February to increase to 3.9% from an estimated 1% in 2008–09. By September the National Treasury was estimating a higher budget deficit due to a decline in revenue. The budget granted 13.6 billion rand ($1.8 billion) in personal tax relief, and 12 billion rand ($1.6 billion) was added over three years to social grants, expected to benefit some two million more people. Some 4 billion rand ($535 million) was allocated to the expanded public works program, with a promise of more if necessary from a contingency fund. Total spending for 2009–10 was budgeted at 841 billion rand ($109 billion).

Foreign Policy

Speaking to the UN General Assembly on September 23, President Zuma outlined a foreign policy in continuity with the Mbeki presidency and emphasized the importance of dealing with climate change. The South African government continued to monitor precarious situations in nearby countries, notably Zimbabwe.